


Night Cat and His Human

by Draco_sollicitus



Series: Damerey Tumblr Collection [3]
Category: Star Wars, Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: BB-8 IS A CAT, F/M, Fluff, Modern AU, Neighbor au, Poe Dameron Is A Mess, Tumblr Prompt, meet cute
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-12
Updated: 2018-06-11
Packaged: 2019-05-21 05:10:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14908964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Draco_sollicitus/pseuds/Draco_sollicitus
Summary: Poe Dameron struggles with the day to day after his return from war. He has few constants in his life, one of which is his darling, semi-overweight cat. Between doing his Basic Human Activities and pining after the beautiful girl next door, Poe has his hands full. He really doesn't need his cat to run away.But...





	Night Cat and His Human

**Author's Note:**

> This is from a tumblr quote prompt: "I know it's three in the morning, but I can't find my cat"
> 
> And you can guess who the cat is.

Poe Dameron is a Human Disaster.

None of his friends would argue against that statement. Some, like Finn Trooper, would probably argue  _for_ it loudly, with charts and diagrams proving the reasons why Poe Dameron most closely aligned with a flaming dumpster full of bad decisions. 

So he’s a bit of a mess. He’s exhausted, all of the time, and grumpy, and most likely inches away from yelling at incompetent people at any given second. Poe naps more than he talks to people, always uses the self checkout, and hasn’t had a green vegetable in four months. His cat’s his best friend, and he’d really Rather Just Not with most people. 

He knows he wasn’t like that before, but that’s how life is now. There was the Poe Before, and the Poe After. The Poe Before turned his crankiness into humor, made jokes, charmed men and women alike, was excitable, entertaining, interesting.

The Poe After just really needs everyone to shut up for a few seconds and let him be. 

After leaving the service with a stack of medals, a bad back, and nightmares enough for an entire platoon, he settled into a duplex on the edge of Coruscant, a pleasant seaside town, with his weirdo, chubby cat. The duplex is perfectly nice, in a very quiet neighborhood, and thankfully he has the bottom level, so he doesn’t deal with stairs very often.

But, his duplex also presents a Major Problem. Poe Dameron, Human Disaster, shares his duplex with a person most commonly referred to in apartment 7A as:

The Prettiest Person to Ever Walk the Earth and Torment Ex-Pilots With Her Sheer Perfection. 

She had smiled at him when he moved in a month ago, her whole gorgeous face lighting up with it in a way that Poe typically associated with sunshine, so what did he do? Oh, right. He managed a half-smile back, dropped the box of dinnerware he was carrying on his foot, cursed a blue streak, rammed his elbow into the wall next to him, and then cursed some more.

Some time in the middle of ….all of that…Finn, the disloyal bastard, had marched forward with his hand extended, made introductions with the Ethereal Creature of 7B, and then steadfastly refused to tell Poe her name. 

“Go talk to her,” Finn had suggested cheerfully.

“I will murder you so hard,” Poe warned, slamming his door shut behind them (When he opened the box, he groaned upon discovering all of the plates had broken. All of them. Because Of Course). 

“I should tell her you said that!” Finn had been removed from the apartment two minutes later, screaming, “She should know that she’s living with the Grinch!”

So, here in the present, Poe spends most days talking to his cat, trying to get his cat to lose the weight he had gained during his last deployment (and that’s the  _last_ time he ever leaves the thing with Lor San Tekka, what was he feeding him, a strict diet of filet mignon?), and generally avoiding people. His cat’s his best friend, and is decent conversation, and his dad calls him twice a week to check in on him. What else does Poe need?

But, Poe Dameron is a Human Disaster, and he’s due for a catastrophe. 

Or should he say: a Cat-astrophe. 

One night, Poe wakes up gasping from a nightmare. It’s a typical one, with fire and blood and screaming and his friends reaching back for him from a place he sometimes wishes he’d followed them to. He can’t get his breathing to quite settle, and his stomach roils, so he rushes to the front door and gasps for fresh air out on his step. He puts his head between his knees after he collapses into a seated position, weaves his fingers together behind his head, and forces his breath into a more regular pattern.  

After maybe ten minutes, he’s collected himself and is feeling sleepy enough to at least try lying down again, so Poe stands up and walks back inside, pushing his door open.

Pushing. His door open.

His open door.

Poe slaps his forehead and walks inside. “Beebs?” He calls uncertainly. “Beebs you there?” No cat comes running, but his cat’s a stubborn ass on the best days. Poe grabs the treat container and rattles it around (a surefire way to have a streak of orange hurtle for his legs).

Nothing.

Poe checks under his bed, behind the couch, and in the kitchen counters before the panic gets so bad he can barely see straight. He runs back outside, ignoring the complaint of his back and knee, and looks around desperately. He rips at his hair, moaning to himself and then looks up. 

The lights in 7B, where The Prettiest Person to Ever Walk the Earth and Torment Ex-Pilots With Her Sheer Perfection lives, are still on. Poe sighs to himself, checks the time, and then slaps his forehead again. He walks up the stairs to her entrance and knocks, loud enough to be heard, but not loud enough to startle anyone (he hopes).

He hears footsteps approach the entrance from the other side.

“Hey!” Poe says, wincing at how hoarse his throat is. He wipes his eyes with the back of his hand because apparently at some point his eyes started watering over his stupid cat. The tiny, fat bastard. “It’s the guy from 7B. Your neighbor.” 

There’s the sound of a lock sliding and a chain being lifted, and the door opens.  The Prettiest Person to Ever Walk the Earth and Torment Ex-Pilots With Her Sheer Perfection stands there in an over-large sweatshirt (a boyfriend’s? a husband’s? _Get it together, Dameron_ ) that’s long enough to cover any shorts if she’s wearing them ( _Get. It. Together. Dameron_ ), and he determinedly does not look at her long, tan legs. 

She’s smiling at him though, and he sees that her eyes are hazel, and she has a dusting of freckles over her tanned cheeks and pert nose, and god, he isn’t ready for this. But, Beebs needs him.

“Hey uh, I know it’s three in the morning … but…. I can’t find my cat? Have you…have you heard anything? Seen him maybe? He likes to climb. He’s like, you know, this big,” Poe gestures uselessly with his hands, “Answers to Beebs. Orange and white. A little chubby?”

“A little chubby?” Her accent is British, and Poe swallows against his panic for a second so he can catalog how nice her voice is. “You’re saying that that monster is only a _little_  chubby?”  

Poe’s too happy to be insulted. “You’ve seen him?” He breathes. “He got out, I left the door open, I usually don’t go outside at night, obviously, uh, but he got out, and you know he’s like, my buddy, and -”

“He’s right here?” The girl opens the door a little wider and gestures with her head for Poe to follow her.

Beebs is sitting like a smug king on the girl’s tabletop. Her window is thrown open to the night air, and there’s a small bowl of water in front of the cat. 

“Beebs!” Poe cries, relieved. He rushes forward and scritches him under the chin.

“I’ve just been calling him Night Cat,” the girl laughs, and Poe turns to stare at her, confused.

“Night Cat?” He repeats.

“Yeah, Night Cat. I work weird hours, helping people with tech problems on the other side of the world. That’s why you never see me.”  _No, it’s actually because I’m anti-social, but sure, let’s pretend it’s **you** that’s weird here. “_ Beebs here usually pops up and talks to me in the middle of the night.”

“Usually?” Poe seems to have turned into the mythological Echo in the face of her beauty. Great. This is going great.

“Yeah. I hate to tell you this, but your cat gets out most nights.” She laughs lightly, and it’s such a pretty sound, Poe can’t even scowl at his cat. “But look, he’s so pleased with himself!” She walks over and scritches behind Beebs’ ear, and the cat preens under the double attention. “Little monster must have wanted us to meet.”

“Must have, yeah,” Poe says wonderingly. He swears Beebs smirks at him. “I’m Poe, by the way. Poe Dameron.” He holds his hand out, and does a very small internal victory dance at the Very Normal Human Interaction he just achieved.

“Rey,” she says, smiling. “Rey Niima.”

“Rey? Like ray of sunshine?” Poe grins at her. “I like it. Good name.”

“You’d be the first to think that,” she says softly, still scratching Beebs. Then, she shakes herself. “Sorry. That was inappropriate. I don’t uh - talk to people much? Unless it’s about tech. I’m sort of a Human Disaster.”

Poe leans back against her kitchen counter and grins at her, a real honest grin that feels more like the Poe Before. “Tell me about it, Sunshine.”

**Author's Note:**

> chapter twooooo?


End file.
